Christmas...and not a fried banana in sight.

The Logos staff Christmas party was last night, and I did my part as a verified Sunshine Committee (aka Party Planning) member by...
1. Arriving early to help decorate the pillars with festive ribbons
2. Providing many people's first-ever taste of buckeyes (balls of peanut butter and powdered sugar dipped in melted chocolate chips) - who knew they were such a regional dish? By the way, I used some precious US chocolate chips, since only one grocery store here carries any. Since even those wouldn't melt properly on my overactive stovetop, it was a labor of love by Sarah and me.
3. Playing the Yankee gift swap game, using the gift Sarah wrapped: a free Rudy DVD that we found in our apartment when moving in. It had the dubious distinction of being the last of 26 gifts to be chosen from the pile. At least it went to Shirley, another Philly native, and not one of the guards or cleaners who speak next to no English and have never seen a football game.

By the way, the big joke in planning the potluck dinner was how many fried bananas there would be. Last year, apparently all 8 or so of the guards decided that fried bananas from street vendors (delicious and cheap) would make an excellent addition to the feast. This year, we instituted a signup sheet for various categories, in part to impede a similar glut of fried fruit. It seems fried bananas here are Cambodia's answer to Doritos.

Click here to see photos of our rooftop festivities at the principal's house.

Cool Season

...was this morning! I know for a fact, because I experienced it. Today's low was a paltry 74, the lowest so far in October/November. When I walked to school at 7 AM, I did not sweat. I had no desire to jump in the pool. In fact, in my T-shirt and capris, I almost shivered during one particularly fierce blast of wind. It was dry. It was cool. It was refreshing. It was real. And it might even happen again in the next few months.

It was so cool, I didn't even want to turn on the air con ("air conditioning" in Asian English) in my classroom. Unfortunately, while half my students huddled in thin cotton zip-up sweatshirts, the other half insisted air con was still necessary - a point not entirely irrational. Because cool season or no, the high today was 87. (We've had one day below 86 since October 1.)

I had nearly given up on cool season as a myth with which to lure unsuspecting foreigners. Supposedly, it started a month ago and will continue through February or so. Khmer people even claim that it's noticeably less sweltering than a few months ago, though they concede it's been extra-humid. But all this week, as usual, my subdued evenings of reading and grading have left me uncomfortably sticky. (Outside was a bit cooler, but I was too far from the window.) I keep trying in vain to sleep without my fan. That's why the cool season came as such a delicious gift.

As for winter? That, for me, starts next June, when I arrive back in Doylestown for two months. Bring on the blankets, the cardigans, and the wool socks! I'll be ready for those unseasonable blizzards...or just for Pennsylvania's typical temperature mood swings.

Samto Cookies

I'm being lazy and just linking to the Facebook album. (You can view it even without a Facebook account.) There, you can read the story of a mouse, a small river of dirty laundry water, a disapproving landlady, and the thumbprint cookies by which we sought forgiveness. (Sorry for the delay...I tried to post this a while ago, but Facebook wouldn't display the link that works for people without accounts.)

Ludicrous!

This flooding issue is really absurd. For one thing, I was told that Pchum Ben usually marks the end of the rainy season, but that was over a month ago and it rained for hours last night. I like rain, but not when it ruins people's lives.

Sarah attends a Khmer-language church in Russey Keo, a poorer area where the floods have been especially bad. Often, the church can't meet in its normal location due to flooding, so it meets on the side of the road, several blocks away. Often! Last night, she wanted to go to Bible study at someone's house, but was told that motos can barely get through there because of the knee-deep standing "water." (Don't even THINK about the diseases in it.) Anyone who can has moved in with friends or even found a new house. This neighborhood is only two or three miles from my house!

This is not a new problem. But it's been vastly exacerbated in the last year or so by a building project that involves filling in a lake with sand, along with forced evictions. Many locals protested the project to the government. The government now drains downtown runoff water into this neighborhood as well. See a connection? It's hard to say, but they think it's to punish the protesters. Brilliant, eh? "It's already flooded. Let's send more water that way." Last year, a high school closed for months in this area because it was under four feet of water. Thousands of residents saw an improvement when the city paused in filling the lake, but now the project has begun again. Japan is helping Cambodia plan an adequate sewage/drainage system for the city, but I have no idea how long that'll take, or how many officials will get rich off the funding.

So, just to recap:
1. Heavy rains => floods
2. Building new developments => filling in a lake => floods and protests
3. Protests => draining other parts of the city here => floods
4. Japanese aid => rich officials and hopefully improved drainage in the future

If my blog is shut down next time you log on, you'll know that Prime Minister Hun Sen found it and that I'm on a plane across the Pacific.

Hitler on my kitchen counter

Can you identify the golden-brown object in the center of this photograph?
Read on for the answer.

Because Logos provided us with many dishes and utensils before we moved in, it took us a while to notice it on the kitchen counter. By the time I arrived on July 25, Sarah had been there for several days to get set up, and both of us never thought about it. One day, though, Sarah approached me.

"So I was looking at our neighbors' balcony," she commented, "and they have a tiny wooden house on it."

"Oh, really?"

"It looks kind of like our little house, but it has incense in it. Do you think it could be...?"

Oh, dear, I think she's right. I had just noticed it for the first time that week, because Sarah had started to leave her keys on top of it. Brilliant!, I thought, you'd never lose them that way. I hadn't thought about its intended purpose, though, except maybe as a souvenir. Wow, I felt slow.

"I can't believe I've been leaving my keys on the spirit house!" Sarah groaned. "What must the neighbors have thought, if they noticed it through the glass door? What should we do with it?"

We knew that most Buddhist families had some kind of spirit house inside to honor their ancestors, similar to the shrines we'd seen outside, but we'd never seen a spirit house. We concluded that since Logos wouldn't have bought it for us, it must have been a housewarming gift from our landlords. One which we had obviously failed to properly respect. But did it deserve our respect? Or is it creepy, even dangerous, to have a home for whatever spirits drop by, sitting right on your kitchen counter?

We concluded that it was time to get rid of it. But how? A spirit house isn't something you just regift. No, throwing it out was the best option. We prayed nobody would find it in the trash and feel offended. Picking it up, we noticed a large, disgusting bug clinging to it. "Hey, doesn't Buddhism teach that evil people reincarnate as bugs?" We decided that, if Buddhism is true, we must have Hitler's spirit clinging to that cute little house. No, thank you!

Tossing it in the trash, we heard the house crunch as we closed the lid. Good riddance!

Teacher Retreat at Koh Kong

This is how much Logos loves us: they gave us a three-day all-expense-paid retreat at the lovely town of Koh Kong! This is what a bad blogger I am: it was nearly a month ago. But better late than never, right? It was my first trip outside Phnom Penh since I arrived three months ago, and a meaningful time for me in many ways.

Bathing suits are not big here: you wear your clothes in, or if you're little, you skinny-dip like the boy in the center. We didn't know this family, but they were tickled to be photographed.

One thing that it showed me is that the Logos administration is flexible. At first, they envisioned the retreat as a seminar for expatriate (foreign) teachers on handling stress. But some of the teachers approached them about including the Khmer (Cambodian) teachers and assistants as well. The administration extended the invitation to them, even though it meant exceeding their budget, and I was so glad. The time I spent with Khmer staff on the retreat left some of my most significant memories.

Chenda and Srey Roth were in my small group. They were so much fun at the waterfall, too!

We all crammed into three vans on a blazingly hot Wednesday afternoon. When we arrived, though, it was blessedly cool and damp – typical for this town on the Thai border. The chilly weather all three days was a welcome respite from the constant sweat of Phnom Penh, although by “chilly” I mean “I wished I had brought jeans.” It rained a good bit: enough to turn the dirt roads into mush, but not enough to stop us from hiking to a “waterfall” (aka stream). The hotel provided the only hot showers I’ve had since July, which are also the only ones I’ve wanted. They say PP will cool off soon – we’ll see.

The waterfall wasn't that impressive, but I loved the scenery around it!

The seminars included beautiful times of prayer and worship, talks by various staff, small-group discussions, and everyone performing skits on methods of stress relief. The latter were hilarious and a good exercise in cross-cultural communication. Most of the Khmer had never been in any kind of skit before, and were understandably scared about them. So when the first group (topic: saying “no” to commitments) talked about relieving stress by refusing to do the skit, it was perfect! My group had to discuss a long time to come to a consensus about our skit. Brainstorming and ruling out ideas are not emphasized in Khmer culture, so our Khmer members kind of felt stuck doing whatever the other American and I suggested, despite our urgings to the contrary. Other highlights included “Monsieur Grenouille” (Mr. Frog), explaining the French art of massage, and a big Italian guy role-playing as an elderly Khmer woman.

Gotta love the safety standards: a young boy unplugs a drain 3 stories above the pool

It was fun to get a glimpse of life in this sleepy town, and to hear about the provinces from Khmer staff. (Hardly any Cambodian today has always lived in Phnom Penh, given its recent history. And even those who have usually still have relatives in the provinces.) Passing hut after thatch-roofed hut on the trip, with vast open spaces in between, made me wonder if I'd ever live in the provinces, and how I'd like it. Honestly, I'm guessing that I will at some point - albeit maybe not in one of those little huts. All I know is that when I returned to Phnom Penh, I was glad to be back. It may be hot and crowded, but it's familiar, and it felt like I was coming home.

The view from the 4-hour car ride: lush scenery = my favorite stress relief

Your creativity needed!

I have an urgent request for your help. This is important. It involves chocolate for me. (And I can give you chocolate when I get back to the US sometime, if you want.)

Logos is moving to a new building in the spring. We're leaving our current location for a new school that will be starting: a Christian school for middle-class Khmer students. They're looking for a name (in English) for the school. The administrator is offering "a chocolate prize" to those with good suggestions.

So, in case you got lost along the way, let me summarize. If you help me think of a good name...
1. You could have a Cambodian school with the name of your choosing.
2. I could have chocolate.

Oh, wouldn't that be lovely?